Foundation for new span awaits Hudson River thaw

Jan. 8, 2014

Chunks of ice float in the Hudson River near the Tappan Zee Bridge on Tuesday. / Ricky Flores/Journal News

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Ice chunks in the Hudson River have forced officials to suspend construction on the foundation of the new Tappan Zee Bridge, project leaders said.

“Tappan Zee Constructors is unable to work on the water at this time due to icy conditions in the Hudson River,” TZC spokeswoman Carla Julian said in an email to The Journal News. “Some of the team’s tug boats are patrolling areas where it is safe to do so until temperatures rise and ice melts.”

When work will resume depends on how much ice thaws in the coming days, Julian said.

Temperatures are expected to remain below freezing Thursday before climbing into the low 50s over the weekend.

Before sections of the river froze, crews had been installing giant piles that will support the new Tappan Zee. TZC’s schedule to finish the bridge in 2018 takes into account the possibility that work could be suspended for two months each winter over the next four years, said Brian Conybeare, special adviser to Gov. Andrew Cuomo on the project.

There are currently no plans to remove equipment from the river, and activities continue on land, Julian said.

On Wednesday, the Coast Guard reported that 50 percent of the Hudson was covered in ice, which was 2 to 3 inches thick.

A major choke point was near West Point, said Lt. Ken Sauerbrunn, commanding officer of the Coast Guard Cutter Sturgeon Bay. His ice breaker was working between Kingston and Albany, and had seen ice as thick as 8 inches, as it worked to ensure the safe movement of commerce.

“Once we break up that ice that accumulates near West Poiint, it all starts flowing downriver and starts accumulating near Tarrytown and the Tappan Zee,” Sauerbrunn said.

Around 9 a.m. Wednesday, an out-of-service NY Waterway ferry left Haverstraw for routine maintenance at the company’s work dock in Port Imperial, N.J. But the ice was too much.

The captain of the Governor Thomas Kean, who was accompanied by a deck hand, determined the ice could clog the jet intakes and disable the vessel, NY Waterway spokesman Pat Smith said. The Haverstraw-Ossining commuter ferry has been suspended this week for that reason and its riders are being bused to the Metro-North train station in Tarrytown.

“They decided there was more ice then they wanted to face so they turned back,” Smith said.

Smith said a tug went in front of the ferry and broke up the ice as it returned to Haverstraw.